“E-‘MAY’-NUELLE”
FORMAT: BLU-RAY
A young engineer named Francesco (Enzo Bottesini) comes to a beautiful island to begin construction on a silver mine. Since a sexy local girl named Janine (Laura Gemser, making her film debut and billed simply as “Emanuelle”) likes to frolic in the nude, it makes it difficult to get any work done. Work comes to a crashing halt when the pair start balling all over the place. However, a series of accidents also prevent him from going back to work. It also seems that the man Francesco’s replacing happened to meet an untimely end on the island. By the way things are looking, there’s a good chance he is going to follow in his predecessor’s footsteps.
Amore Libero: Free Love is one part “Average Schmo Taking in the Picturesque Local Color’ movie and one part skin flick. The lackadaisical pace doesn’t do it any favors, and the plot meanders like a sumbitch. That being said, Gemser finds lots of excuses to get naked, so it’s not all bad. (We also get an eyeful of Olga Bisera, who makes a terrific entrance doing a Lady Godiva number.)
Even though it’s not part of the “official” Emanuelle series, there are scenes of animal cruelty that occasionally rear their head, so it at least feels like a continuation. The scene where Gemser punches a turtle (!) is odd, but the tasteless moment when a bat is skinned and crucified was unnecessary. The half-assed horror elements that crop up in the second half are pretty unsuccessful too. Plus, it almost feels like they forgot to film an ending as everything is wrapped up via a way-too convenient voiceover in the end.
Still, it’s obvious that even early in her career, Gemser had the “It Factor”. She’s able to overcome a weak script on sheer beauty alone and has plenty of screen presence to boot. About halfway through, there’s a great trippy sequence set against an aquatic backdrop that showcases and repackages all her nude scenes into one psychedelic burst of cinema. For the most part, the movie itself if kind of a dud, but it still remains worth watching for fans of Gemser.
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